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Athens News Courier (Newspaper) - February 12, 2005, Athens, Alabama
S vu roaV, February 12, 2005Serving Athens and Limestone County: A Community of Tradition and Future
enewscourier.com
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Classified 4-5A
Comics..........6B
Ledger ..........3A
Obituaries 2A
Mary Margaret Case Andrew Barret Cathey Jr. George Shellie Perry Jerry Wayne Robinson Herb L. Scott
Outdoors.........8B
Sports .........1-5B
Weather .........3A
iNews-Courier/Kim Rynders
West Limestone High School Baseball Coach Mike Bishop, center, who recently returned from a from a deployment in Iraq with his Army Reserve unit, gives batting instructions to Wildcats Cullen Lovell, left, and Cole Mitchell.
West Limestone coach rejoins baseball team after year at war
By Rex w. Greene
[email protected]
Mike Bishop can't even consider the thought.
Bishop, a teacher and head baseball coach at West Limestone High School, was deployed to the Middle East last year along with the rest of his 342nd Quartermaster Battalion in the United States Army Reserve.
But instead of being sent to Iraq, Bishop's battalion was sent to Kuwait, away from the fighting.
“Sometimes 1 regretted that we didn't go to Iraq, especially when you saw all the soldiers that went there and died," said Bishop, who is now back at West
Limestone preparing for the 2005 high school baseball season.
Bishop returned to West Limestone in November, a little less than a year after he was called into active duty with the reserve unit.
It was unknown until the final day w'hether Bishop, a lieutenant colonel, and his battalion as going to be deployed in Basrah, Iraq or Kuwait. The orders came down to go to Kuwait where Bishop and his men worked as a receiving station for soldiers leaving the Iraqi theater.
“We never said no to a soldier,” Bishop said. “We ran a redeployment camp and everybody coming out of Iraq
came through there. You're talking about 18 and 19-year-old kids who had been in combat. We wanted to give them everything they needed."
Bishop said one of the toughest things he did was watch as soldiers went back to Iraq from his camp.
“Probably the worst thing I had to do was, when a 19-year-old soldier committed suicide, I had to then tell his unit it had to go back into Iraq,” Bishop said. “That was tough, but that was just part of being my rank."
The times were hard, but Bishop believes they weren’t as hard as people
See War, Page 2A
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Back from Iraq
¡MM Off
Hey, Sound Off:
Proponents of the school tax renewal claim its defeat will necessitate drastic cutbacks. If the i tax is defeated does that mean the superintendents will set the austerity example by accepting salary reductions? 1 say not likely, but they continue to “cry wolf” and we have heard it all before.
— Taxed to death
More Sound Off Sunday
Daily Bible Moment
on have considered my trouble; You have known my soul in adversities.
Psalm 31:
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322 H»). 31 N • Athens 256-232-1051 obit line 256-771-0934
Area in full swing
Six local teams playing for the right to advance to another round in high school basketball.
mws-Courier
Two Tanner residents were in the Limestone County Jail Friday accused of selling a pound of marijuana to an undercover police officer.
In addition. Decatur police and Limestone County authorities raided the home of the two suspect? at LawsonVTrailer Park and confiscated two more pounds of the drug.
Chadrick Oneal Allen. 23, and Retnna Lyn Gill. 40, both of 10420 U.S. 31 South, Tanner, are charged with distribution of a controlled substance by Decatur police and first-degree illegal possession of marijuana by Limestone County authorities. Bail bond has been set at $5,000 each in Limestone County. They remained in jail Friday.
Drug and narcotic units from Decatur and Limestone County worked on the case. Undercover officers made the arrests after the suspects allegedly sold the marijuana to the undercover officer at Calhoun Community College in south Limestone County.
Officers from. the Decatur Police Organized ( rime Unit and the Limestone County Narcotics Unit then searched a home at Lawson’s Trailer Park just south of Tanner Crossroads where they found about two pounds of marijuana, drug-sale and drug-use paraphernalia.
Sonny Turner
Woman who found baby child’s mom
Thousands raised for Boys and Girls Clubs
By Tashia Lovell
[email protected] More than $23,000 was raised to help the Limestone County Boys & Girls Clubs at the organization's annual banquet Thursday night.
“We had an awesome auction last night,” Emily Page said Friday. Page added the B&G clubs received unexpected donations, including a $2,000 grant from state trial lawyers and a $10,000 donation from the Athens Athena League.
Athens attorney John Plunk, a participating member of the Alabama Civil Justice Foundation, presented the $2,000 check to the local organization.
The B&G club was among the non-profit organizations that were recently awarded a grant from ACJF.
“I am so pleased that the ACJF was able to support these much needed services,” said Plunk, who is a partner in the
See Thousands, Page 3A
News-Courier/Kim Rynders
Ardmore’s Ronnie Cornelison holds up an oil painting that was auctioned by his twin brother, Donnie, at the Boys and Girls Club banquet Thursday night.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — The woman who claimed to have seen a baby being tossed from a mov ing car fabricated the story as a cover to abandon her newborn and hide an unwanted pregnancy from her family* authorities said Friday.
“It's not as horrible as we first thought," Broward County Sheriff Ken Jenne said. “The baby was never thrown out of a moving car. This is the case of a disturbed woman who gave birth and did not want to keep her child.”
Jenne said the woman, identified as Patricia Pokriots, 38, kept her pregnancy a secret from her family and others. She had planned to take the baby to authorities, then built her story around seeing two people in a large white sedan arguing. “One story built upon the other,” Jenne said.
See Baby, Page 2A
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Two jailed after robbery
Lawmen say Athens pair robbed store for money to buy drugs
in raid
Limestone County j native and country I recording artist Brad ; Pullum performs in j Athens
Pictures Sunday
Cats: Friend, foe?
Free ranging cat individuals can kill more than 1.000 wild animals per year.
'{ Several studies found { that up to 90 percent of a free ranging cat’s diet was wild animals and less than 10 percent of * rural cats killed no wild animals
8B
By Sonny Turner
[email protected] Claiming they needed more money to support their crack cocaine drug habit, two Athens men were arrested late Thursday night after they robbed Jeff’s Mini Mart on Alabama 99 just north of Athens.
David Wayne Monroe, 43, and Thomas Heath Skiff, 44, both of 702 North Madison St.. Athens, were in the Limestone County Jail Friday under $10,000 bond. Both have been charged w ith second-degree robbery.
The two were taken into custody oft' Plato Jones Street in Box Alley. Limestone County Chief Investigator Stanley McNatt
n’t told us anything.”
The clerk at the store, located across from Carter's Trailer Court, said a man walked into the business shortly before 9 p.m. and grabbed money as the clerk opened the cash register. He then fled the store with a hand full of $20, $10 and $5 bills, said McNatt.
“We think Monroe was driving and Skiff was his passenger when they pulled into the store parking lot. When Monroe entered the store. Skiff got out and got on the drivers side and left the passenger door open," McNatt said.
They left driving south toward Athens in a dark colored GMC pickup truck, he
said.
Lt. Brian Ruble recognized the vehicle and stopped the driver in Box Alley. Deputies and Athens police then converged on the scene and took the two men into custody.
McNatt said Skiff is on disability. He said authorities have determined that Monroe has a job, but did not say where.
“Monroe has admitted they robbed the store and he says the> did it because they needed more money to by crack (cocaine).” McNatt said.
Cash that McNatt said was taken in the robbery was recovered when law men took the two men into custody.
David Monroe Thomas Skiff
said authorities believe they drove there after the robbery to buy drugs.
“Monroe has confessed saying they robbed the store to buy drugs,” said McNatt. “But Skiff refuses to talk. He has-
Drugs
seized
;